Tech Tip: Edit photos online

Adobe Photoshop is largely considered the industry standard of photo editing software but not everyone requires the large array of features Photoshop offers. Many casual photo editing tasks can be done without purchasing the $500+ software package; without purchasing or installing any photo editing software for that matter.

There are a few online photo editing websites that allow you to manipulate images simply from your web browser. These websites are useful because they are free to use and you do not need to install any software on your computer making it available wherever you can access the internet. Another advantage of these photo editors is that, since they are web based, they are also cross platform and work on Windows, Mac and Linux operating systems.

Pixlr provides a photo editing experience that users of photo editing software will find familiar. It’s layout is similar to that of Photoshop, admittedly without all the bells and whistles. It is however a step up from Microsoft Paint and offers features such as layers and filters that can be applied to these layers. Pixlr can be used both to create images from scratch as well as edit existing images.

Picmonkey is a less conventional photo editing application focussed on editing existing images ad not creating new ones. It allows for basic editing such as cropping and resizing and also offers a large range of predefined effects that can be adjusted to your preference. Although it lacks advanced photo editing capabilities its quick results and fun image modifications make it another interesting option.